


The Nuances of Human Romance

by Cookiemonster2000



Series: Assorted Specieswap Fics [1]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: Dave and Jade are morails, Dave and Karkat are buddies by this point, Dave steadfastly refused to admit he thought of Jade as anything but a morail, F/M, Meteor Trip, and they both miss Jade, another specieswap, context: Karkat had constantly bugged and prodded Dave about his feelings for Jade during their game, so they bond by talking about her
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-27
Updated: 2018-08-27
Packaged: 2019-07-03 07:57:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 969
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15814719
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cookiemonster2000/pseuds/Cookiemonster2000
Summary: Dave finally comes clean to Karkat about his feelings for their friend.





	The Nuances of Human Romance

"I dunno, man. I guess you were right."

They were sitting on the edge of the meteor, legs dangling down, staring out into the sea of bubbles and stars against a background of midnight sky.

Karkat, who was lost in thought, jumped. "What?"

"I said I guess you were right." Dave responded, knitting his fingers together over his lap.

The boy snorted. "Of course I was right. I'm _always_ right."

"Mhm."

There was silence for a minute or two.

"Wait, right about _what_?" Karkat demanded. "What was I right about?" 

"Jade. You were right about Jade."

"What specifically about Jade was I right about? Dammit, Dave, you need to quite being so cryptic with your--"

"About me. And Jade."

Karkat's mouth dropped open. "I was?"

Dave still studied the sky. His expression was unreadable behind his sunglasses. "Yeah."

"Shit. I'm sorry." He bit his lip, trying to read his friend's face. "I thought I was just... I'm sorry."

"Nah. Don't be." Dave stretched and flopped down on his back, staring directly upwards. "If anything, you saying something should've made me realize I had to do something."

"You actually _did_ like her?"

"Well, of course I liked her. We were fucking _morails_." Dave shot back.

"But--in a not-alien way."

"Yes, Karkat, that is what I'm trying to say here. That's what I'm trying to tell you."

"Well. Shit."

Karkat twiddled his thumbs and waited for his companion to speak again. He didn't.

"Do you wanna... talk about it?" he asked tentatively.

"Yeah, actually." Dave cleared his throat. "Did you ever see her, uh, eyes?"

Karkat pondered, tapping his finger on his chin. "You mean, her totally-average-in-every-way, yellow eyes with black pupils? Those eyes?"

"No, dude, the eyes we have on our buttcheeks. _Yes, Karkat, her eyes_."

"Yes, I saw them. What about them?"

"Did you happen to..." He stopped. "Did you happen to notice how they sparkled when she was excited about something?"

Karkat stopped and thought back. The first time he'd seen the troll girl on his computer, she'd been chatting with a friend--probably Dave, now that he gave it a thought. She had been laughing hysterically, doubled over. When she'd looked up and caught the camera, her face was still red, and her grin was huge.

She'd waved.

"Yeah." He cleared his throat. "I did."

"And her hair," Dave said quickly, "it was such a mess, all the time!"

"It totally was. Had she ever brushed it?" Karkat bit back a laugh.

"She never brushed it except on special occasions!" the troll exclaimed. "She hated how the recupercoon slime always got it tangled, and she didn't bother to brush it even after she'd washed it out. I swear to gog, she could've strangled somebody with that hair if she really tried."

"And her thing about running around!" Karkat added. "She always had to be heading somewhere. . . unless she was asleep."

"She always tried to put on a happy face for me," Dave recalled quietly. "She hated our world, and she hated the hemospectrum, and she hated our rulers. We'd make plans to run away together as an unstoppable morail duo and overthrow the evil empire. But whenever I said, 'dude, let's do it tonight,' she'd be like, 'no, we have to wait just a little longer!'"

"She was waiting for the game."

Dave nodded. "She'd seen the clouds of Prospit in her dreams and was sure we'd get our happy ending through it."

He stopped short, and looked back at the sky.

"Guess she was wrong, huh?"

Karkat bit his lip. "Dave. . . we _are_ going to see her again. Her _and_ John."

"John's great. I can always count on John to be my best bro. But I'm worried Jade's gonna realize how much better she deserves than me, and leave me in the dust."

"That's retarded," Karkat retorted. "She totally had a thing for you, too."

"Yeah, a pale thing."

"It could've been--"

"Look. Karkat." Dave sat up with new intensity. "What we had was _amazing_. I loved being Jade's morail. We could talk about anything, talk shit about everything, and just being with her would cheer me up. We could always trust one another to have each others' backs. It was the fucking best. Except for the part where it was so. . . carefully platonic."

"Why was it platonic?"

"'Morails don't pail', the saying goes, and it's the way shit is." Dave went a bit red and coughed into his fist. "But. It means. Pale is one thing, red is another. But I didn't _pity_ her at all. I thought she was great. I thought she was _awesome_. But I didn't want to put her on a pedestal--I was willing to help her with her issues, and wanted her to help me with mine. I wanted to be able to tease her and get a rise out of her and have it not just be 'aww, look at the best morail friends,' like it always was. I wanted to help her, I just _also_ wanted to, like. . . kiss the sad look off her face? Sometimes? That sounds super weird and gross but it was like, what I wanted to be with her wasn't really in any quadrant--or it was all of them."

Dave sighed heavily and leaned back onto the concrete, staring up at the sky behind his shades.

"Unheard of, right?" he muttered under his breath, almost afraid of the inevitable disgusted response his alien friend would give him.

"Not really," Karkat replied casually. 

"Why, it's totally--"

"What you're describing is human romance in a nutshell. You want to human marry her. Can't say I blame you."

He got up, stretched, and walked away.

Dave blinked.

 

"Wait, really? It is??"

"Yes. Fuck, you guys are such freaks. . ."

 

 

" _How do you get human married_???"

**Author's Note:**

> I will forever stand by the headcanon that troll romances are just fancier, better-defined versions of the single human "quadrant". All of them together make human romance.
> 
> Karkat is an elitist about his own species' romance no matter whether he's a troll or a human. It's kind of a universal constant.


End file.
